Australia helps schools with water, sanitation in PNG

Australia has continued  to assist many schools in Papua New Guinea. Recently, over  400 pupils attending Lombrum Elementary and Primary Schools in Manus now have access to improved ablution blocks and water tanks through the assistance of the Australian Government.

This was announced in the ninth issue of the Manus Igo Het newsletter by the Australian Government which injected about K892,000 into the project.

The schools, which are situated near the Regional Processing Centre, received two water tanks and two ablution blocks for boys and girls while a restroom was built particularly for students living with disabilities.

In November, Lundret Primary School had new classrooms, a storeroom, ablution facilities and teacher housing funded by the Australian Government’s aid programme to the province. Among the developments, school infrastructure assistance has been provided on 20 sites across Manus including M’buke, Bipi, Baso, N’Dilou, N’yada, Harangan, Lau, Pateku, Metyih, Mouklen, N’drehet, Likum, Metepong, Nohang, Waratalai, Andra, Lomoei, Aua and Wuvulu.
The Australian Government has also boosted its support of vocational skills training by providing K1 million to build a new classroom, ablution block, fencing and equipment with other materials for Manus Training Centre.

The provincial economy has seen about 1000 new jobs created since the processing centre was established with spin-off benefits to 33 local businesses through the purchase of goods and services by the processing centre on a weekly basis amounting to about K2.1 million which was a great benefit.